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From Potential to Long-Term Client: Your Guide to Effective Lead Management

Acquiring new customers may be challenging, but it’s not impossible. In fact, effective lead management can be broken down into just four stages: initial generation, filtering, contact, and nurturing the lead. With these stages, it may be possible to convert a potential customer into a long-term client very efficiently.

Initial Lead Generation

The first stage of effective lead management is, of course, the initial lead generation. It’s all about getting these potentials interested in your business. In the digital age, it’s important to consider your landing page — or, more accurately, pages — but for many, this is easier said than done. This is an area that appears simple but is actually quite complex, and it’s a time to forget everything you thought you knew about content. In terms of SEO, the quality of the content is always more important than the quantity, but this doesn’t quite ring true for first impressions. According to research, the more landing pages the better, with experts claiming that a website with 40 or more landing pages can generate 12x more leads than a website with five or less landing pages. This is because multiple visitors aren’t always looking for the same information or the same overall experience with your brand. Diversity during initial lead generation is the key to getting the hook.

The Filtration Process

It would be nice if every visitor to your website was a good candidate for a long-term client, but sometimes, a potential client and a business just aren’t a match; it happens. This is where the filtration process comes into play. Due to the time and costs associated with obtaining new customers, it’s not a sensible solution to attempt to follow up with every new lead. It’s important for businesses to focus on those leads with the most potential to ensure a high chance of conversion. The best way to filter these leads is through analytics. Visitor data and activity should be collected and analyzed thoroughly to determine which leads are worth contacting. The good news is that this doesn’t need to be done manually. In fact, there is an automated tool, the Connotate aggregation tool, which does all the hard work for you. This clever content tool helps you to create shortlists of both B2B and B2C contacts, which can be delivered to sales teams for the next step.

Contact

Initial contact by a sales team to follow up on the potential customer’s experience is always an important aspect of conversion. However, this contact shouldn’t be a one-off event; contact needs to be ongoing if it is initiated by the lead. Consider that social media platforms have completely changed the face of consumer interaction. Today, customers have a direct, real-time link to businesses, and they expect this to be a two-way line. Regardless of whether a potential customer has a compliment or a complaint, the way this two-way line is utilized can mean the difference between a lost lead and a long-term client. Reports show that almost 90 percent of customers would move to a direct competitor if they weren’t satisfied with the customer service received from a business, which highlights the importance of ongoing engagement. Perhaps take some time to actively encourage customers to get involved with your business; end a blog post with a question, continue discussions, and don’t be afraid of controversiality.

Lead Nurturing

Businesses can lose up to 20 percent of their client base each and every year through ‘ghosting.’ It’s the business equivalent of not calling after a date. Once you have a customer fully engaged, don’t let them forget about your business, and don’t give them an opportunity to be wooed by a competitor. This can be done through ongoing marketing and advertising. Some people say that email marketing has been replaced by real-time social media updates, but it could also be said that email has never been more important. Email is everywhere; parents email schools to say their children are sick, patients receive email confirmations of doctor appointments, and so on. Thanks to smartphones, we have mailbox access anytime, anywhere. Email marketing isn’t dead. It may not be the trendiest or latest method of advertising and promotion, but in terms of lead nurturing, email can have a truly significant effect.

Staying Up-To-Date

Converting a potential lead into a long-term client isn’t about spending above and beyond on clever marketing techniques or massive advertisements; it’s more simple than that. It’s about staying up-to-date, remaining relevant, and being a consistent feature in the lives of your customers.

About the Author

Brittany Shively is all about customers, from reaching out to them to finding new ways to make them feel special. Currently, she works as a customer relationship manager at Connotate where she's turning her knowledge and passion into actions.